Too Close for Comfort
by whoswho718
Summary: It was so completely carnal, that Meg was temporarily taken off guard at the sudden realization that they had just broached a hitherto avoided level of physical intimacy. Prequel to A Professional Relationship.


A/N: Part 2 (in a sense) of my Meg series. It takes place a couple of months before "A Professional Relationship," and hopefully helps explain some of Meg's rationalizations regarding her too-close-for-comfort relationship with House. It's probably best to read that one first, since I'm not quite sure how much of this will make sense without the histories already covered. Usual sexual warnings apply in full, and there's some drug use, although that's pretty common for House, so hopefully it doesn't bother too many people!

Disclaimer: Oh, come on….

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"Aren't you afraid of cockroaches?" Meg was on her stomach, his pillow underneath her arms, watching him fiddle with a lock of her hair.

"Why does it bother you so much?" Greg dropped her hair and sat up in bed. The sheet pulled away from him as he stretched over her towards his extra Vicodin bottle on the bedside table.

"Because I feel like your normal, well-adjusted middle-aged man grew out of utter slob phase by the age of thirty, or so."

He tried to open the bottle. "How can you think that given your profession?" He tried prying the cap off with his teeth.

Meg rolled her eyes, pushed herself up and snatched the bottle from him.

"Oww!" he complained. "I think you chipped a tooth."

She wiped the bottle on the comforter. "I couldn't have. Most of your teeth are capped, anyway."

"Are not," he replied defensively.

She twisted the cap off easily. "Oh, classy rejoinder there, Greg."

"All I'm saying," he continued as if she hadn't said anything, "is that if you think I'm a well adjusted middle aged man, you can't have known either many well-adjusted men, or many middle-aged men." He took the bottle and dry-swallowed two pills. "Given your profession and your nubile young body, I'm going to go with the former."

"Well, that's probably true," she conceded. "But the truth is that you're the only person I really visit at home. Most of my customers are either business men with company accounts, or married." He handed her the pill bottle and she put it back on the bedside table. "I am, however, well acquainted with hotel rooms."

"You ever read the Bible?" He settled himself back against the pillows. "Since you spend so much time in hotels, and all."

"Well yes," she answered settling herself down onto his chest. "But let's be honest, I rarely spend the night, and when I do, I'm working anyway."

"Come on," Greg said cynically, one hand snaking around her shoulders. "You don't think you could have it open in front of you while he's going at it?"

Meg shifted more comfortably against him and rested her chin on his sternum. "Too much bouncing and the print's too small." The joke deflected the question from what would otherwise be an uncomfortable topic.

There was a pause. Meg was positive that he had sensed her discomfort, and for a minute, she wondered if he'd pry even further. But he moved on.

"Well, if the dishes really bother you, you could just wash them."

Meg turned her head and looked up at him. A beam of light from the street crossed his features, and she could see the look of amusement in his bright blue eyes. "I _do_ wash them."

"For free," he pointed out with a sense of profound satisfaction.

Meg settled back down against him. His fingers moved slowly up and down her bare back, and she shivered, despite the warmth of the evening. She draped one arm across his waist. "They're getting worse, too. Last time it took me half an hour to finish them. My hands were prune-like by the end."

"Which is one reason I'm glad you waited until after your main task was finished. _Then_ you let your twitchier, more anal retentive self shine through."

"Technically it's not for free," Meg said, her fingers worrying the edge of his comforter. There was a small hole in the seam. "Since you pay me for my time. The longer it takes, the more you pay."

His fingers had inadvertently worked their way into her hair which played across her bare shoulders. "Think of it like two jobs. Or," he said thoughtfully, "it could just be like I was fucking my housekeeper."

Lying in bed naked, Meg's skin felt hypersensitive. She felt herself responding to his touch as his hands wound their way intricately through her hair. She had always been of the decided opinion that hair, dead tissue or not, was a major erogenous zone.

She turned her head to look up at him again. He looked comfortable, relaxed, and Meg felt a twitch of regret that she was being paid to bring him this sort of comfort when he really was quite capable of getting it on his own. His eyes were a bright spot in the dark, and without thinking about it, she leaned up and kissed him.

His mouth opened against hers, and he pulled her towards him with his free hand. The hand in her hair cupped the back of her head, and Meg, through the burgeoning haze of arousal, could feel the entire length of his body pressed up against her. His left leg burned against her right one, and her breasts were firmly against his chest. It was so completely carnal, that Meg was temporarily taken off guard at the sudden realization that they had just broached a hitherto avoided level of physical intimacy.

Meg's virginity had been sacrificed on the alter of peer pressure at the age of sixteen and in the back of a Ford Prefect. Since that less than ideal first experience, she had gradually accumulated a fair bit of knowledge about the nature and power of sex. There was basic fucking, which was the type her work led her to participate in most frequently. It usually involved relative passivity on her part, and was engaged in with the minimal emotional involvement for both parties. Then there was casual sex, which was the type she had had with male friends in college: uncommitted, carnal, and yet with some level of genuine affection. Finally, there was the act of making love, which Meg had viewed as a sort of emotional pinnacle. Love making itself was somewhat tiered and didn't necessarily need to involve genuine love; nonetheless, love making was distinguishable from casual sex because it was always motivated by pure, unadulterated emotion. Emotion drove every aspect of the act; physical release took a backseat to emotional release.

This kiss had been motivated by genuine emotion – though Meg was far too befuddled to determine exactly what that emotion was – and that realization hit her like an eighteen-wheeler truck. She broke away from the kiss and shoved herself roughly away from him. In her haste, she forgot both his leg and his hands in her hair.

"Mother fucking god-damned son of a bitch!" he hissed, breathless from the sudden jolt of pain to his leg. He grabbed at his injured thigh reflexively, yanking heavily on her hair.

It hurt. A lot. Meg felt her eyes tear inadvertently. "Fuck!" she swore, turning away from Greg's more creatively profane form and swinging her legs over the side of the bed. The "fuck" was dual-purpose.

She looked at her bare feet, shadowed in the darkness. Her toenails, painted Raspberry Blush, looked black in the anti-light. This was not good.

"What in the bloody hell did you do that for?" Greg asked from the other side of the bed. "Jesus…" He still sounded pained.

"Sorry." She threw it over her shoulder perfunctorily, her thoughts spinning wildly through the motivations for, consequences of, possible reactions to, and general problems with the kiss she had just given him. She tried rationalizing it, but reason kept interfering. It meant something, at least to her, and that was antithetical to everything she needed to do to keep her job from overwhelming her life.

"Way to sound genuine," he grumbled, reaching beside her for the Vicodin bottle on the table.

"You just took one," she admonished absently, her head still whirling. She curled and uncurled her toes in his carpet.

"Two," he corrected. "And if you had remembered your professional responsibility and not engaged in some impromptu, poorly-timed, badly-executed bedroom acrobatics, I wouldn't need to take a third."

"Sorry," she repeated. Her scalp felt raw where he had pulled out several strands of hair by the roots. "Hey, can I have one of those?" At the very least, the pills would calm the thoughts swirling around in her head. She turned and looked at him over her shoulder.

He popped the cap off of the bottle and dumped another pill into his palm. "I'm really not in the mood to be generous at the moment." He threw the pill back and closed his eyes in anticipation of the pain relief.

Meg turned back to look at her toes. "That's what we call the placebo effect, you know," she mumbled.

"Hey," he replied, "I'm the one who went to medical school." The bed creaked as he shifted his weight again. She felt him tap her shoulder with the pill bottle.

"Thanks," she said, reaching over her shoulder and taking it from him. Her fingers brushed his lightly. "Really, I am sorry."

"It's hard to navigate around," he said in a surprisingly understanding tone. "It just got jolted. Had you put all of your weight on it, scrawny as you are, I would be a little less affable."

She smiled slightly and stood up to walk into the bathroom. "You're hardly affable." She could feel his eyes following her. Normally, it was motivated by a sexual appreciation on his part; this time, she knew he was studying her in an effort to figure out what had been the source of her sudden discomfort. She squared her shoulders and turned on the bathroom light.

"Eh," Greg said amiably, "It strikes me as a relatively fair trade-off. You jarred my leg, and I, in turn, ripped out ten – no, scratch that – thirteen strands of your hair by the roots."

Meg looked at herself in the bathroom mirror and popped the pill into her mouth. In the cold, harsh, fluorescent lighting of the bathroom, she looked pale and sickly, but she usually did. Fluorescent lighting was never flattering to very pale people. She turned on the tap and cupped her hands underneath the stream of water; the coolness was comforting. Her head started to clear slightly.

She leaned over and took a sip of water. The pill was large and Meg, who didn't often swallow pills larger than a 200mg Advil, had difficulty swallowing it. It seemed stuck in her throat. She leaned down and took another sip of water.

"That's a good position for you," she heard Greg call from the other room. "Find yourself bent over like that a lot?"

Well, Meg thought, he was back to his usual crude self. She straightened up and looked at herself in the mirror, absently smoothing her tousled hair. The Vicodin was sitting illicitly in her stomach, and the promise of impending fuddled brain function loomed comforting in the near future. She flipped off the bathroom light and turned to face him sitting up in bed. His eyes gleamed in the dark.

She leaned absently on the doorframe and crossed her arms over her chest and studied him for a moment.

"Are you coming back to bed?" he asked impatiently.

"Haven't decided yet," Meg replied. She knew that she would, but her rational self needed the pill to kick in before she could put herself in a sexual situation with him and not find herself experiencing genuine affection or even –

Meg cut off her inner monologue before it progressed any further.

Greg harrumphed from the bed. "Well what the hell do expect me to do with myself while you ponder? I mean, it's kind of awkward with you just standing there. If you were doing a kinky little strip-tease, it would be one thing, but you're not."

Meg felt the corner of her mouth twitch. "Do you _want_ me to do a striptease?"

"Are you offering?"

"It'll cost you extra, and you have to provide the music."

"Dylan okay? I think that's what's on pause on my ipod."

She rolled her eyes. "Appearances on Victoria's Secret commercials aside, I feel like Dylan just wouldn't provide enough of the necessary gyration opportunities. Besides," she pushed herself off of the doorframe and sauntered slowly back towards the bed, "the point of the striptease is to get naked. I'm already naked." She climbed onto the mattress and rocked back to sit on her heels.

Greg's eyes flicked down from her face to her breasts and then back up again. "Well that adds valuable time, then," he announced and slid a hand around her waist, fingers tugging her forward towards him. Meg, who was now feeling a little light-headed thanks to his generously offered Vicodin, let herself be maneuvered. She had never taken it before, and it worked quickly.

He leaned over and nipped her neck. His two-day old stubble rubbed erotically against her skin. "Just a warning," he murmured against her neck, "pain medication generally decreases sex drive."

Meg smiled and tried to push away from him. "Doesn't seem to for you."

He pulled her back against him, her breasts pressed up against his chest, and began teasing her shoulder with his teeth. "How would you know?" he asked sardonically. "I mean, naturally it decreases horniness proportionally." His hands shifted slowly up her ribs and skated along the edges of her breasts. She shivered and tangled a hand into the thinning hair at the back of his neck. Greg continued on conversationally, "Obviously, the more virile lose some of their performance capacity, but it's really hardly noticeable." He pushed her down against the pillows.

Meg was definitely stoned, and didn't really resist. The pill hadn't decreased her sex drive. Greg propped himself up on an elbow and looked down at her. His eyes were slightly hooded as well. "Has it kicked in yet?" he asked her, reaching over to draw patterns on her stomach with his fingernail.

Meg nodded; her mind was getting fuzzy, and she was having trouble concentrating on anything than the feel of his fingers as they dipped in swirling patterns up and down her torso.

"Good," he said, and his hands moved up to her breast and pinched.

Normally, it would have hurt – or at least stung – under the dulling effects of his pilfered pain medication, it sent a jolt of electricity straight to her toes. She gasped and arched off the bed towards him. He laughed slightly at her reaction and leaned over to kiss her.

It was a hard kiss: demanding and sensual, and Meg arched into it, concerns about ethics forgotten in the bruising crush of his body pushed harshly against hers.

His fingers pinched again, and then moved roughly down her sides – much harsher than usual, but it felt good – and over her hip, pulling their lower bodies into better contact. Christ, she was wet. His penis was pushing up against her opening, and the suddenness of the contact made her grind harder against him. Through the fog that was clouding her brain and her judgment, Meg marveled slightly at how little foreplay it had required to get her clutching and panting against him.

He squeezed her thigh hard enough to leave marks. Meg's befuddled brain – _this is your brain on drugs_ – surged with serotonin and sent another sexual jolt straight to her loins. She moaned into his mouth and ran her fingernails across his back. She was probably leaving scratch marks that would raise a lot of questions at work if anyone ever saw them, but at that particular moment, she didn't really care. He squeezed again, and she made an unfamiliar guttural noise in her throat that would have taken her by surprise had she been physically capable of giving it any thought.

She pushed him back roughly and climbed on top of him, never breaking contact. Greg's head hit the wooden headboard, but he too was too far gone to do more than grunt against her mouth. She tried to pull away from him to reach for the box of condoms he kept in the bedside drawer, but he grabbed the tops of her arms roughly and yanked her back down against him. The suddenness of the movement brought their lower bodies into contact again, and Greg arched against her. Meg, sensing an opportunity to get him as worked up as she was, pulled away from his mouth and kissed his collarbone. She ground her hips against his erection again and bit down on his shoulder. He groaned and tangled a hand in her hair as she shimmied down his body so that she could run her teeth over his chest. As she did so, his penis shifted against bundle of nerves between her legs, and caused her to make the guttural throat noise again.

God, she was ready, and if the – _tumescence _– of Greg's penis was any indication, so was he. She pushed off of his chest again, receiving a groan of irritation from him as a reward, to fumble gracelessly for the box of condoms in the bedside drawer. Her hair was falling in her face, and she pushed it hurriedly out of her eyes with one hand as she grabbed at the box with the other. She dumped the box out onto Greg's chest and grabbed the closest packet. Greg grunted, amused, at her haste, and then reaffirmed it by squeezing the tops of thighs as she struggled with the foil packaging. In revenge, she ground down on him again, which made him hiss through his teeth.

"Alright," he said, his voice rough with arousal, "you've made your point. I won't tease."

Meg gave a triumphant hiss of glee, as the packaging finally gave way under her the force of her assault. Really, it didn't give way so much as fall apart. Meg, however, didn't really worry about it; she reached down and rolled the condom down over his erection without much pretense. The necessities accomplished, she clambered back up and positioned herself, guiding him into her. Greg grabbed her hips and tried to help. She sank down slowly, letting him fill her.

He arched into her again, curling his fingers into her waist. She groaned and started to move against him.

It was so much rougher than they usually were with each other. The Vicodin hadn't exactly decreased Meg's sex drive, but it had dulled her senses, requiring rougher movements than usual to produce the same effects. Greg, no stranger to the dulling effects of pain medication, seemed to understand this better than she did, and helped increase the friction by meeting her as she came down on him. His hands alternately searched out her breasts, her hips, her waist, and her rear, squeezing and prodding, and causing her to make that noise in her throat each time he thrust against her. In return, she raked her fingernails against his chest, which caused his thrusts to become less uniform and more desperate.

It took a surprisingly small amount of time for the tell-tale feeling to build in Meg's stomach. She could feel her orgasm looming, and ground against him harder, her fingers curling roughly into his flesh. Greg grabbed her and pulled her down against him, her breasts pressed against his chest, her hands trapped between their bodies. She kissed him roughly and pushed her hips against him again. In this new position, her lying on top of him, they had the perfect geometrical configuration to allow the shaft of his penis to rub across her clitoris as she rode against him. From that point, it only took Meg two more thrusts to send herself over the edge.

She was not a screamer. Never had been, although she was good at faking it when customers needed that type of affirmation. As she clenched around Greg, though, she let out a strangled cry of release and clutched against his shoulders. Greg, never a patient man, continued to thrust into her, which had the added effect of prolonging her orgasm, although upon reflection, Meg would ldecide that this was selfishly motivated. Not that she really cared at the time.

He stiffened as he lost control and squeezed her legs again. She panted harshly against his chest, her brain still fuzzy from the Vicodin and now severely over-taxed by the afterglow. She was suddenly exhausted. She pushed herself off of him, pulling him out of her, and removed the used condom.

For his part, Greg looked a little tired, too. Meg wrapped the condom in a tissue and handed one to him so he could clean himself off before collapsing – spent – onto the bed.

He lay back down beside her. "You're not planning on going home, are you?"

Meg, who had curled quite comfortably into his pillow, shrugged; she was tired and honestly hadn't given it any thought.

"Because it's not like you can drive." He leaned over and poked her with an index finger; she grunted and curled back into herself. "500 mg of Vicoding for someone your size can really pack a punch." She felt him poke her again. She swatted absently at him, wishing he would just shut up and let her go to sleep. "Which," he continued, ignoring her pathetic attempts at reprisal, "it clearly _has_ in your case."

The mattress squeaked slightly as he lifted the sheet around her shoulders. "You can stay here if you promise not to charge me for it."

Meg sighed softly and pulled the sheet towards her. "Promise…."

The mattress squeaked again as he settled back down against the pillows and pulled the sheet up around himself.

But Meg had already drifted off.

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